Steve Simms's Blog, page 314

The root of evils (What can stop mass shootings?)

The further a society gets away from the acknowledgement of God and His standards the deeper it dives into depression, desolation, and destruction. The human heart is like a faucet. If we don’t let the living God run through our heart it gets rusty, stagnant, and stuck in self. Without the passionate and persistent pursuit of the presence and power of God, evil begins to slowly shape our soul.

When evil is welcomed into a person’s heart it will eventually come out in their actions. Hatred and pride are big steps toward violence and murder. We need to nip them in the bud and create a culture where all human beings are respected as infinitely valuable from the womb to the tomb. True love is to care deeply about people whether you agree with them or not, whether you like them or not. There is a great shortage of true love in our culture.

“Resist the root of evils from the very beginning.” –Nicholas Cabasilas

America needs the reality of God — not religion controlled by a preacher or a priest, but the real deal — the living God demonstrating His power and presence. I mean, we’re a mess. We need some real help. Government or politicians can’t fix messed up minds and hearts. Things are desperate and arrogantly calling people names isn’t going to help. It’s time to pray — no, not just say a prayer or two, but to persistently cry out with all of our heart. Help us God! We’re messing things up so baldly. Turn our hearts to You!

Muhammad Ali’s words show courage, conscience, & conviction.

Muhammad Ali, a man of courage, conscience, and conviction, left us. Here are some things he said:

“My principles are more important than the money or my title.”

“I didn’t want to submit to the army and then, on the day of judgment, have God say to me, ‘Why did you do that?'”

“My intention is to box, to win a clean fight. But in war, the intention is to kill, kill, kill, kill, and continue killing innocent people.”

“I wish people would love everybody else the way they love me. It would be a better world.”

“I am a Muslim and there is nothing Islamic about killing innocent people in Paris, San Bernardino, or anywhere else in the world. True Muslims know that the ruthless violence of so-called Islamic Jihadists goes against the very tenets of our religion.”

“Hating people because of their color is wrong. And it doesn’t matter which color does the hating. It’s just plain wrong.”

“Impossible is just a word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”

“Live everyday as if it were your last because someday you’re going to be right.”

“Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go ten thousand miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights?”

“I don’t have to be what you want me to be. I am free to be what I want.”

“If you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven’t learned anything.”

“I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people around the world.”

To read some more quotes from famous Americans against war, click here.

 

Link to Gloria Gaither’s review of Beyond Church

Check out Gloria Gaither’s review of my book Beyond Church: An Invitation To Experience The Lost Word Of The Bible–Ekklesia in Homecoming Magazine at this link. To get a copy in Kindle or paperback go to Amazon.

 

The separation of church and hate

The separation of church and hate (and/or political-correctness-warriors and hate) requires speaking the truth in love.  Hate is not based on truth. It is built on deception, denial, disappointment, dishonesty, misunderstanding, pride, prejudice, anger, hurt, impulse, irrationality, and/or insecurity.

Speaking the truth in love steps beyond the bondage of hatred. While we stay in denial we are stuck in the same situation, however, by facing facts, we find freedom.  Jesus put it this way: “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.”

A culture of political correctness coerces us into the closet of communication conformity. It demands that we speak and write what is mandated by society, not what we really believe. That’s the opposite of love.  Love wants to hear us speak sincerely from the heart, not to hear us parrot a political position under the pressure to conform to contemporary culture.

Name calling, put downs, verbal bullying, mocking, bragging, intimidating, blasting people, accusing, etc. are just the opposite of speaking the truth in love. Political-correctness-warriors often use those tactics in an attempt to trump other’s right to disagree with them. Religious people sometimes use them, too. Even some politicians use those tactics.

Love’s not silent. It’s not passive accommodation.  Love boldly and courageously speaks the truth with kindness, civility, concern, caring, compassion, and even with tears. Love is assertive humility, intervening not to make a point or win an argument, but to make a difference — to heal a heart.

Christ did that. He spoke boldly about where people were off track, not to put them down; but to rescue them from their misery of self-deception and self-destruction.

 

John Doe Ministries (Is that biblical?)

Why do some ministers (even some God-anointed preacher’s and teachers) name “ministries” for themselves? That common practice in modern-day independent ministry doesn’t appear to be biblical. I can’t find an “Apostle Paul Ministries” or a “Philip the Evangelist Ministries” or even a “Peter the Rock Ministries,” anywhere in the Bible.

So many people have named “ministries” after themselves: “John Doe Ministries,” for example. However, God spoke through the prophet Isaiah saying: “I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another.” And Peter said: “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.” Jesus said: “For where two or three gather in My name, there am I with them,” and “And I will do whatever you ask in My name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”

What would God do if someone who has named a “ministry” for him/herself took his/her name off of it and instead put Jesus’ name in the title of the ministry? I believe that simple act of humility would release a fresh surge of God’s power. Will anyone have the courage to take their name off of God’s “ministry” and see? There is amazing power in the name of Jesus!

I don’t know why people self-name ministries. Maybe it is because of tradition: Most of us have grown up hearing about ministries that people have put their names on. It is a popular and common practice. But perhaps they could be even more effective with a name that directly refers to Christ. Perhaps that is something to think and pray about.

Maybe self-naming is thought to improve promotion and fund raising. Maybe ministers believe (or are persuaded by a marketing company) that they need to promote their own name and image because Jesus and His image doesn’t sell well in contemporary society. Perhaps they believe that if they don’t get the public’s attention with their name, and instead rely on Jesus’s name, money won’t come in.  Maybe they think that people would rather “sow a seed” into a ministry that has a nice marketing appeal focused on them and their personality, rather than a ministry focused solely on exalting the living, risen Jesus.

 

A surprising (perhaps miraculous) confirmation of nonviolence

Yesterday was Memorial Day and though out the day I thought about nonviolence and wondered why we humans glorify and celebrate the use of violence and war, generation after generation. Today I felt pompted to pick up the book, When The Holy Ghost Is Come, by Samuel Logan Brengle, out of a stack of books that someone gave me about six months ago. I began to browse through it for the first time ever. To my surprise I came across a chapter called The Sheathed Sword: A Law Of The Spirit and these words:

Jesus said to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight.” The natural man is a fighter. It is the law of his carnal nature. He fights with fist and sword, tongue and wit. His kingdom is of this world and he fights for it with such weapons as this world furnishes. The Christian is a citizen of Heaven and is subject to its law, which is universal, whole-hearted love. In his Kingdom he conquers not by fighting, but by submitting. When an enemy takes his coat, he overcomes him, not by going to law, but by generously giving him his cloak also. When his enemy compels him to go a mile with him, he vanquishes the enemy by cheerfully going two miles with him. When he is smitten on one cheek, he wins his foe by meekly turning the other cheek. This is the law of the new life from Heaven, and only by recognizing and obeying it can that new life be sustained and passed on to others. This is the narrow way which leads to life eternal, and few there be that find it, or finding it, are willing to walk in it.

This is the spirit and method of Jesus; and by men filled with this spirit and following this method He will yet win the world.

Your weapons are not carnal, but spiritual, now that you belong to Him and have your citizenship in Heaven. If you fight with the sword; if you retort and smite back when you are wronged, you quench the Spirit; you get out of the narrow way, and your new life from Heaven will perish.

‘But will not people walk all over us, if we do not stand up for our rights?’ you ask. I do not argue that you are not to stand up for your rights; but that you are to stand up for your higher rights rather than your lower rights, the rights of your heavenly life rather than your earthly life, and that you are to stand up for your rights in the way and spirit of Jesus rather than in the way and spirit of the world.

If men wrong you intentionally, they wrong themselves far worse than they wrong you; and if you have the spirit of Jesus in your heart  you will pity them more than you pity yourself . . . ‘Put up thy sword into the sheath,’ and take mercy and truth for your weapons, and God will be with you and for you, and great shall be your victory and joy.

 

 

Humanity is not just a manatee named Hugh

If someone kills a man to save a child, he is called a hero. However, nowadays, if he kills a gorilla to save a child, he’s harshly criticized. CBS News wrote: “The killing of a gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo in order to save a child who fell in its enclosure has sparked nationwide outrage.”

Human life has been so cheapened in contemporary Western society many would choose an animal’s life over a person’s life. Why? There are many reasons:

Our constant exposure to killing and gore in both media news and media entertainment;
Our continual brainwashing that a prenatal human life is nothing more than tissue and is disposable at the choice of her/his mother.
The justification and glorification of war that saturates our culture.
The brainwashing that declares evolution to be a fact and humans to be nothing more than a mere product of natural selection.
Racism, nationalism, and other isms that (even subtly) declare other human beings to be inferior to us.
Our culture’s almost complete ignoring (and or denying) of the living God and of the value He places on every, individual human life.
Our society’s focus on self-interest and insufficient focus on passionate, self-sacrificing love for others.

Because of this, we have lost sight of the fact that people are not just a manatee named Hugh. We are not just large mammals with personal names and ID cards. We humans are priceless — more precious and valuable than anything on earth. Why? Because:

We are not just physical beings, but also spiritual beings.
We each have a soul that will exist forever.
We are made in the likeness of the Creator of the Universe.
We are passionately loved by God even though every one of us has rebelled against Him.
God has demonstrated His love for every human by becoming a man in Jesus Christ and dying a cruel death on a cross in order to make a way for each of us to return to Him and enjoy Him forever.

Heroes left out of Memorial Day

Are there others who should be remembered on Memorial Day? Have we forgotten about some of the world’s greatest heroes?

On Memorial Day we remember those who fought with violence, death and destruction. Perhaps we should also remember those who fought with non-violent resistance, love, and prayer and overcame their enemies without firing a shot:

The American abolitionists, led by William Lloyd Garrison;
The Indian independence fighters, led by Mahatma Gandhi;
The Civil Rights activists who overcame Jim Crow race laws, led by Martin Luther King, Jr.


The restorers of democracy in the Philippines, led by Corazon Aquino;


Those who brought down Communism in Eastern Europe, led by Lech Walesa;


The early Christ-followers who overcame extreme persecution to conquer the Roman Empire, led by the living, risen Jesus.

Should cat owners have the right to chose to declaw?

(Some of the comments on this post have made me wonder: If cat fetuses were declawed in their mother’s womb, would that make the act less cruel and barbaric?)

Should declawing cats be illegal? A cat owner’s right to choose is under attack in the USA.

–I heard on NPR that some states are making it illegal to choose to have your very own cat declawed. Will the pro choice movement hit the streets in protest? Will Hillary and Bernie be consistent and “fight” for a cat owner’s rights?

–It’s cruel to declaw cats because it is somewhat like removing the last knuckles from a person’s hand. I’m not for cruelty, but I do like to keep things in perspective. A human life is infinitely more valuable than cat’s “knuckles.” I’d rather that cat owners in the USA choose to have a million cats declawed than one person chose to have a prenatal human killed.

If our nation can declare that a woman has a “right” to have her prenatal child killed; then why can’t we declare that a cat owner has a “right” to have her cat declawed? Let’s be consistent and stop both forms of cruelty!

         

Someone posted this comment in response to my putting this on Facebook: “You’re comparing apples to oranges. One thing has nothing to do with the other. Get some perspective.”

Here is my reply: Both examples deal with the issue: Does a person have a “right” to put his/her desires, wants, and/or “rights” above compassion, principle, and the well-being of another? Here’s the perspective: If a state can protect a cat from life-altering cruelty, then surely a state can and should protect a prenatal person from life-ending cruelty.

Are you light-hearted?

Christ-followers are

Called to be light-hearted,

Full of inner brightness,

Radiating love, hope, and joy,

Shinning like beacons in the night.

However, too often our hearts

Have absorbed the darkness

Of our distressed and discouraged world.

Rather than dancing lights,

We’ve become night stalkers,

Imitating the darkness around us.

What can restore love, hope, and joy?

We must find the courage

To roll up our shades

And let one another see

The brightness of Christ

That’s been hidden in us.

What can let us see God’s light


Not just in spiritual heights,


But lived out by regular people


Who gather to be real


And to release the inner light


By openly sharing


The tenderness of Christ


That’s been working


Within each one of us?


The lost biblical concept


Of 1 Corinthians 14:26:


Ekklesia.


(To learn more about the New Testament concept of ekklesia, check out my book: Beyond Church: An Invitation To Experience The Lost Word Of The Bible–Ekklesia.)

(Experience ekklesia every Sunday morning at 10:45 at The Salvation Army Berry Street, 225 Berry St., Nashville 37207.)